


You Take My Breath Away

by virdant



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-29
Updated: 2011-09-29
Packaged: 2017-10-24 03:55:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 769
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/258699
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/virdant/pseuds/virdant
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>Sherlock takes the air from Moriarty's lungs.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	You Take My Breath Away

**Author's Note:**

  * For [reiicharu](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=reiicharu).



> For [Rei](http://reiicharu.livejournal.com) who asked for "breathtaking sherlock/moriarty." As always, when Rei requests a fic from me, I oblige, in the least expected way.

**Title:** You Take My Breath Away  
 **Author:**  
 **Length:** 690 words; super-short  
 **Rating:** PG  
 **Genre:** Gen.  
 **Pairing:** Implications of Sherlock/Moriarty. Mentions of Sherlock/Victor Trevor. Implications of Sherlock/John. Or, to put it simply, Sherlock makes lots of people go breathless.  
 **Summary:** _Sherlock takes the air from Moriarty's lungs._  
 **Warning:** Suggestions of possible potential death.  
 **Notes:** For who asked for "breathtaking sherlock/moriarty." As always, when Rei requests a fic from me, I oblige, in the least expected way.

 

 **You Take My Breath Away**

 

 

Sherlock takes the air from Moriarty’s lungs.

He picks the lungs carefully. The best lungs, full of the best oxygen, for the best brains.

Sherlock takes the air from Moriarty’s lungs with the ease of years of practice.

It started when Sherlock was five. He turned to Mycroft and said, thoughtfully, “I think that I can make you go breathless.”

“So do it,” Mycroft replied languidly, not looking up from his book.

And Sherlock did.

“You reach under and over,” Sherlock explained later, remembering the sensation of reaching and pulling. Mycroft staggered, lungs suddenly empty, eyes suddenly glazing, and Sherlock let go.

It’s easy, pulling the breath from Mycroft’s lungs.

It’s harder to do it to other people.

*

The human brain requires oxygen to function.

The human body, actually, requires oxygen to function. Aerobic respiration. Each cell greedily sucks oxygen from haemoglobin.

Sherlock sucks oxygen from lungs the way cells suck oxygen from iron complexes. Easily, as if it belongs to him by right, and the lungs are only there to transport it to him.

“I’ve always been able to,” he says when Lestrade asks, clutching his chest as he struggles to breathe. “It’s easy,” Sherlock says.

“Freak,” Donovan snarls.

Sherlock looks at Donovan. He can practically taste the breath in her lungs. “It’s no harder than breathing,” he says.

That is a lie. It’s harder than breathing. Breathing is effortless, muscles moving involuntary—ribs, expanding; diaphragm, contracting. In contrast, sucking the breath out of Lestrade’s lungs takes effort. The effort of thinking. The effort of trying.

Except that’s not much effort at all. Sherlock knows that because nothing really takes much effort.

*

In university, Sherlock makes a habit of sucking the air out of lungs wherever he goes.

Sebastian doesn’t take kindly to it.

Victor, on the other hand, finds it fascinating. He likes to press his lips to Sherlock’s and murmur, “Take my breath away, Sherlock.”

Sherlock does. Does for months and then years and finally stops, because the air in Victor’s lungs has grown stale and the appeal has worn away.

His mind knows everything it needs to know with the air in Victor Trevor’s lungs.

It’s not enough.

He needs more.

*

It’s instinct that makes him reach (over and under) the minute he sees Moriarty. Just instinct.

Moriarty staggers.

And then Sherlock can’t breathe. There’s a vast emptiness in his mind, and all he can think of is that he can’t breathe. Because there’s nothing inside his mind but the vast emptiness of not-thinking.

It’s terrifyingly empty.

And then he inhales. Inhales and thinks again.

Moriarty looks at him, pale and smug. “It’s really quite easy,” he says.

“Yes,” Sherlock says.

They reach at the same time, steal the breaths out from each other. It’s a circle of theft and selfish taking. Moriarty steals from Sherlock who takes from Moriarty and in the end nothing has changed.

Except for John, in the corner, holding a gun to Moriarty’s head.

“Oh Sherlock,” Moriarty says with the air from Sherlock’s lungs. “For me?”

Sherlock steals his breath back. Breathes in the sight of John, good solid steady John.

And then he gives it back. All of it. Enough that he can hear the sound of the the air rushing back to Moriarty’s lungs. Enough that he can feel the lungs expanding against their will, sucking in air uselessly.

Then he runs. Runs until it’s hard to breathe and he can’t think except for the mindless grind of muscles burning, lungs aching, can’tbreathecan’tbreathecan’tbreathe.

This is what it’s like to be John, Sherlock (doesn’t) think. This primal mindlessness. This inability to function at the peak of his ability. This is what it’s like to be normal.

*

(It’s boring, isn’t it? John’s lungs whisper to him when he approaches. It’s so boring, isn’t it?)

(You know you just want to think more.)

John never protests when Sherlock takes the air from his lungs. Never.

Sherlock breathes in. Breathes and doesn't stop until John’s eyes are no longer focused and his mind is tediously slow. Breathes wonderfully fresh oxygen.

And feels the world expand around him.

 

end.

**Author's Note:**

> [Chemorphesis](http://chemorphesis.webs.com)   
> [Masterlist of BBC!Sherlock fanfiction here](http://virdant.livejournal.com/44488.html#cutid2)   
> [Masterlist of fandoms here](http://virdant.livejournal.com/663.html)   
> 


End file.
